Josep Borrell Fontelles (Western Catalan: [dʒuˈzɛb boˈreʎ fonˈteʎes]; born 24 April 1947) is a Spanish politician who served as High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and Vice-President of the European Commission from 2019 to 2024.

[8] After completing primary education, the remote location of his village led Josep Borrell to be home-schooled with aid from his mother and a retired teacher, taking the official Baccalaureate exams at the Lleida high school.

Borrell also holds a master's degree in applied mathematics (operations research) from Stanford University in Palo Alto (California, US), and a postgraduate in energy economics from the French Institute of Petroleum in Paris (France).

[16] From 1975 to 1982 he also worked for Cepsa, employed at the company's Department of Systems and Information Engineering; he combined this activity with the teaching of university classes and involvement in local politics.

He became known for his actions seeking to combat fraud and tax evasion, going after the rich and famous, including celebrities such as Lola Flores, Marujita Díaz or Pedro Ruiz.

[52][53] Thus began an uneasy relationship and power-sharing—the "bicefalia" (duumvirate)—between the official party leader, Almunia, and the prime ministerial candidate elected by the members in the primaries, Borrell.

Though not involved in the inquiry into property purchases, Borrell resigned from the role of Prime Ministerial candidate, stating that he did not want the affair to damage his party's chances in the upcoming local and general elections.

[3] Amid the sixth term of the Cortes Generales, Borrell was elected to chair the Joint Congress-Senate Committee for the European Union in October 1999,[58] replacing Pedro Solbes.

Reelected as MP for Barcelona in the 2000 general election, Borrell repeated as president of the Joint Committee for the European Union for the full 7th parliamentary term.

[62] In 2004, prime minister and PSOE's leader José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero proposed Borrell to lead the Socialist Ticket in the 2004 European elections.

[citation needed] In July 2004 Borrell was elected President of the European Parliament, as a result of an agreement between the EPP and the Socialists, becoming the third Spaniard to hold this position after Enrique Barón and José María Gil-Robles.

[citation needed] Borrell collaborated along with other prominent PSOE figures, such as Cristina Narbona, José Félix Tezanos and Manuel Escudero, in the making of Somos socialistas.

Borrell co-authored Las cuentas y los cuentos de la independencia ("The calculations and tales behind independence"), a 2015 essay that vowed to dismantle the economic arguments laid out by the pro-independence movement.

[82] 22 years after the end of his last tenure as member of the Government of Spain, Borrell assumed the portfolio of Foreign Affairs, European Union and Cooperation on 7 June along the rest of the new cabinet in La Zarzuela.

[87] Borrell had a meeting with Mike Pompeo, where the Spanish delegation expressed concern over the US protectionist drift; discrepancies were found between the two countries in their approach to migration policies.

[96] Given the aggravation of the political crisis in Nicaragua, in December 2018 Borrell pressed EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs Federica Mogherini for EU-wide involvement in the situation.

[99] During the electoral campaign, he appealed to the unity of Europe and stressed the need for EU member states to pool sovereignty in order to survive as a civilization.

"[112] Borrell said that proposed Israeli annexation of the West Bank "could not pass unchallenged" and warned that "failure to adequately respond would encourage other states with territorial claims to disregard basic principles of international law".

"[117] On 24 April, the EU's foreign security policy agency, the European External Action Service (EEAS), published a report on disinformation related to the COVID-19 pandemic.

[citation needed] Multiple EU officials told BuzzFeed News and The New York Times that they were angry and disappointed by Borrell's focus on leaks and, in particular, his singling out of junior staff members.

[130] In August 2021, Borrell received criticism for sending a high-ranking EU representative, Enrique Mora, to attend the inauguration of Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi.

"[134] Borrell and Saudi Arabia's Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud also discussed the conflict in Yemen and the humanitarian situation in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.

[135] On 8 October 2021, Borrell said the EU's relations with Turkey has significantly improved and he called his relationship with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan "excellent".

Borrell said the situation in Ethiopia was "one of my biggest frustrations" of the year because the EU was not able to react properly to the large-scale human rights violations, "mass rapes using sexual violence as a war arm, killings and concentration camps based on ethnic belonging.

[139] Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine on 24 February, Borrell and European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen were part of an EU delegation visiting Kyiv on 8 April.

[143] On 13 October 2022, when speaking at the European Diplomatic Academy's inauguration ceremony in Bruges, Belgium, Borrell declared that "Europe is a garden and the rest of the world is a jungle."

"[150] On 21 September 2023, Borrell released a statement which condemned the military operation by Azerbaijan against the Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh and deplored the casualties and loss of life caused by the offensive.

[152] On 3 January 2024, he condemned the comments of the Israeli ministers Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, writing, "Forced displacements are strictly prohibited as a grave violation of [international humanitarian law] & words matter.

[176] He has been a keen participant in the annual festivity in his native Pobla de Segur descending the Noguera Pallaresa river, in which the stream is rowed down by the partakers as log drivers (raiers).

[1][5][177] In November 2018, the national stock market regulator in Spain concluded that Borrell traded shares of the company Abengoa while in possession of insider information.